Sorrows of a Bald Schoolteacher
by FrostBlte
Summary: He started teaching to leave his pain behind. Why is it that he's only forced to endure a different kind. A partial character examination of Professor Jean Colbert, and his views/interactions with one Louise de la Vallière. (Pre-Springtime Ritual)


Professor Jean Colbert disliked conflict; which was understandable, because he had spent almost half his entire life entrenched within it. He had developed spells that would scorch battlefields, flames hot enough to melt glass and smooth stone, and had likely killed more innocents in slaughter than even the most pitch-hearted of criminals, all upon orders, of course.

However, he had grown tired of orders. Tired of the smell of burning flesh pervading his nostrils with each spell cast; and so, he retired from the battlefield, laying down his military merits and lethal spell catalysts before unexpectedly applying for a teaching position at a Magic Academy. The school's Headmaster had been quick to inform him that he was 'A poor, deluded fool', but in the end, after much prodding, he got his wish.

The weary veteran frequently wished he hadn't.

The Academy was just another battlefield, albeit with a nicer, more hygienic name plastered onto it. Politics ruled here, more than knowledge. Jean quickly realized that his many pupils could, in fact, care less about the intricacies of magic, or the advancement of the sciences. They wanted the biggest, flashiest spells they could cast, and nothing more.

So the years past; and as he taught year, after year, he found himself gradually lowering his expectations more, and more, and more, until finally, one day, someone happened to meet them.

* * *

Her name was Louise de la Vallière, the daughter of Karin, his old superior officer. She had been young then, perhaps fourteen years of age, and yet so very much her mother's daughter. He wouldn't be ashamed to say that he hadn't batted an eye at her appearance in his class; no, he welcomed her, and then moved right along.

The subsequent days, however…

If ever he had seen someone more stubborn and thick headed than that girl, he couldn't bring them to mind. Karin's daughter put even her mother to shame in regards to her sheer, tenacious, and single-minded focus. Failure after failure, and yet his student still kept trying. Jean couldn't, for the life of him, understand it.

Louise's theoretical work almost brought him to tears of joy with each paper he read. She understood the material he was teaching, perhaps even better than him, and yet each of the girl's spells fizzled with explosive and often messy force, miraculously sending classrooms into messy disarray and a few of his fellow teachers into conniptions whenever she was mentioned within faculty meetings.

However, it had taken only a glance to see the sharks figuratively circling the waters around his promising student. He had noticed in the classroom, to be sure, but it had been her assignments which drew the most attention. Gone were the girl's insights, the subtle humor that accompanied her assignments, and in their places were swathes of text taken from her books, reworded and regurgitated onto sheets of paper that, when read, were so dry that he could almost swear that they could be cut.

It had to stop. Damn school politics and damn his personal policy. If he didn't make a stand for this, then why was he teaching in the first place?

Unfortunately, the first day he had addressed the issue had also been his last. The young Vallière had taken him aside, and in no uncertain terms, asked him to stop. Needless to say, Jean had been surprised; although, he shouldn't have been, and shame on him for having forgotten one of the core principles regarding his student. Memory served that Karin wouldn't have asked for help; going so far as to shy away from it, in fact. Why would her daughter be any different?

So, Jean gave Louise an ultimatum. He would not interfere with her issues so long as her grades returned to how they had been before. Of course, she had agreed, and he left matters to rest for the time being. One week later, and Louise's grades were back up to snuff; and although her written assignments lost their dry edge, they never did regain her subtle humor.

Thus ended the reign of Louise de la Vallière, and thus began the reign of 'Louise the Zero'.

* * *

Time passed, as it often did; and with each day Jean watched the young Vallière withstand the torment of her peers, he bemoaned her stubbornness. He looked on, helpless, as the girl slowly locked away her emotions, as the light left her eyes, and as she gradually deadened herself to the world.

The weary veteran turned his eyes away after that, unwilling to watch; and though he kept to his side of the bargain, he cursed every minute of it.

Then Kirche von Zerbst happened.

Imagine his surprise, when after going so long at seeing the young Vallière deaden herself to everyone around her, he walked into his classroom resigned to start another lesson, only to see her red faced and yelling at one of the Germanian transfer students. Jean was…startled; unnoticed to him, his mouth was left quite open, and he was quite obviously staring at his two students squabbling between each other.

At that moment, he felt a weight lift off his shoulders; and though it took a student to remove him from his self-induced stupor, he found himself not quite caring. Consequently, as Professor Jean Colbert, retired war veteran and murderer, began to start his lesson; he hoped as much as one such as him could dare, that his student stayed as she was now.

Who knows, perhaps this teaching thing would be worth it, after all.

* * *

**AN:** _This is a one-shot, but hopefully the first of many one-shots that will pave the way to a rather ambitious story that I have in the brain-pan._

_I like to think I've captured Colbert pretty well with this chapter, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do._


End file.
